Indonesian Journal of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science

Vol. 20, No. 1, October 2020, pp. 39~45

ISSN: 2502-4752, DOI: 10.11591/ijeecs.v20.i1.pp39-45  39

Mitigation of magnetising inrush current in three-phase power

transformer

Mudita Banerjee, Anita Khosla

Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, Manav Rachna International Institute of Research and Studies, India

Article Info ABSTRACT

Article history: During energization of no-load transformers, a high and peaky current flow
on the primary side which has rich second harmonics. This current is
Received Jan 27, 2020 magnetising inrush current and it is generated when transformer core is
Revised Mar 29, 2020 driven deep into saturation. This current has various disturbances on
Accepted Apr 13, 2020 transformer attribute; reduced life-span, major voltage drop, insulation
weakening, electrical and mechanical vibrations in coils, difficulties in
protecting relays and all leads to poor power quality of the electric system.
Keywords: This paper presents the analysis and comparison of recent techniques to
reduce the magnitude of inrush current during energization of power
Controlled switching transformer. The simulation results are provided for Pre-insertion of resistors,
Inrush current Controlled swithing and Pre-fluxing method. The best method is suggested
Power transformer for mitigating inrush current by simulating in MATLAB/SIMULINK environment.
Pre-fluxing
Pre-insertion resistor Copyright © 2020 Institute of Advanced Engineering and Science.
Residual flux All rights reserved.

Corresponding Author:
Mudita Banerjee,
Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering,
Manav Rachna International Institute of Research and Studies, Haryana, India.
Email: mmmudita@gmail.com

1. INTRODUCTION
With rise in technology and industrialization, there is a requirement for an uninterrupted power
supply. Further, it needs flawless operation of an electrical system. Single-phase and three-phase power
transformers are essential devices and hence, they need special protection and maintenance. The differential
protection relay, which is the conventional protection system in large transformers, mal-operates during
magnetizing inrush condition. M. Steurer inspected the effect of inrush currents on the transformer windings
and his results show that the 70% peaks of inrush current causes same impact as that of short circuit [1].
Magnetizing currents appear during the energization of power transformer due to its core magnetization and
saturation. This core draws a very large current, about 3 to 7 times the rated current. The expression for flux
just after switching can be written as in (1).

  R  m cos  m cos t    (1)

Thus, flux in the transformer is a function of the residual flux, instant of switching, magnetic
properties of core. This current has various disturbances on transformer attribute: reduced life-span, major
voltage drop, insulation weakening, electrical and mechanical vibrations in coils, difficulties in protecting
relays and all leads to poor power quality of the electric system [2-5]. Many inrush current mitigation
techniques have been proposed over the years each with its own advantages and disadvantages. From the past
few years, research is going on to mitigate this current [6-16]. Controlled switching in transformer can
possibly remove these transients if residual core is considered in the closing process [17-18].
Another researcher, Yu Chi had proposed a method wherein a grounding resistor is connected to the neutral
point of transformer. Their results show that after energizing each phase sequencially, the behaviour of

Journal homepage: http://ijeecs.iaescore.com

40  ISSN: 2502-4752

neutral resistor is like a series-inserted resistor and it decreases magnitude of inrush currents [19-20].
Inrush current in power transformers can be controlled by applying long pulses. This is because current lags
the voltage wave. The inrush current reduces as the firing angle increases. The magnitude of these currents is
low at 90 degrees [21-22]. This paper presents the analysis and comparision of recent techniques:
Pre-insertion resistor; Controlled switching and Pre-fluxing method, to reduce the magnitude of inrush
current. The simulation results are provided in MATLAB/SIMULINK environment.

2. SIMULATION OF POWER SYSTEM

This section describes the simulation of magnetizing inrush current in a saturable core transformer.
The simulation of the system is performed in MATLAB. The parameters of the power transformer considered
in this paper is given in Table 1. This 50 MVA, 220/66kV power transformer is connected to the three-phase
source through a three-phase circuit breaker. The block diagram of the simulated model is shown in Figure 1 with No-
Load condition. Figure 2 shows the magnetizing inrush current for phase „R‟ which is simulated for 1 second.

Table 1. Power transformer parameters

Nominal power and frequency S=50 MVA; f=50 Hz
Primary winding parameters V1=220kV R1=0.02 L1=0.08
Secondary winding parameters V2=66kV R2=0.02 L2=0.08
Core loss resistance Rm=500Ω

Figure 1. Simulink model for Inrush current without mitigation

Figure 2. Magnetizing inrush current of 50 MVA transformer

The magnitude of inrush current is 307 A at the first peak, which is about 3 times the rated current.
And after 1 second, it comes up to around 200 A. There is a DC component present in inrush current
waveform and is rich in second harmonics [2]. The presence of DC component slows down the response of
protection system and generally deteriorates the discrimination ability of the relay. Figure 3 shows the normal
current at the primary side of the transformer when it is on no-load condition. Inrush current mitigation
techniques presented in this paper are Pre-insertion resistor, Controlled switching and Pre-fluxing. The effect
of application of these techniques on the magnitude of inrush current can be seen in the next sub-sections.

Indonesian J Elec Eng & Comp Sci, Vol. 20, No. 1, October 2020 : 39 - 45
Indonesian J Elec Eng & Comp Sci ISSN: 2502-4752  41

Figure 3. Line-to-line normal primary current

2.1. Effect of pre-insertion resistor

The inrush current can be reduced by inserting the optimum value of resistance at the primary side of the
transformer. Table 2 demonstrates the magnitude of inrush current for various resistance taken between zero
to 425Ω. Figure 4 shows the graph of inrush current value at various values of resistor. The results direct the
best value of resistance as 382Ω with a minimum insertion time of 10 msec that will eliminate transient
during energization. The waveform is shown in Figure 5. The magnitude of inrush current decreases to
the rated current of 131A. The magnitude of inrush current is decreasing between 350 Ω to 400 Ω resistance
and mitigate at an optimum value of 382 Ω as cited in Table 3.

Table 2. Inrush current magnitude for different values of resistors

External Resistance (Ω) Phase R Current (A) Phase Y Current (A) Phase B Current (A)
0 307.20 -192.36 -192.23
50 269.80 -177.35 -167.91
100 237.42 -167.00 -148 .12
150 211.38 -157.24 -132.60
200 187.77 -148.76 -119.81
225 179.71 -144.55 -115.19
250 171.07 -140.93 -110.66
275 162.74 -137.42 -106.53
300 155.21 -134.02 -102.74
325 146.94 -130.73 -98.95
350 139.72 -126.08 -95.44
375 132.94 -124.00 -92.95
400 123.15 -118.03 -89.10
425 117.02 -114.77 -86.25

Figure 4. Graph showing inrush current value at various values of resistor

Table 3. Inrush current for R=382Ω

Optimum resistance (Ω) Inrush current (A)
Phase R Current (A) Phase Y Current (A) Phase B Current (A)
382 131.11 -123.60 -92.14

Mitigation of magnetising inrush current in three-phase power transformer (Mudita Banerjee)

42  ISSN: 2502-4752

Figure 5. Inrush current in three phases with pre-insertion resistor technique (R=382Ω)

2.2. Effect of controlled switching

All three-phase systems have a 120 electrical degree phase shift between each phase. A standard
three-phase circuit breaker switches all three phases at the same time. With controlled switching, the phases
are independently operated at the most favourable time instant for minimizing electrical transients [23].
The benefits of Controlled switching are:
a. Better power quality-Lower inrush currents; lower voltage transients
b. longer service intervals for the circuit breaker
c. reduced electrical stress on substation equipment [24].
In this method, three single-phase circuit breakers are connected on each phase and are operated one
after the other with 120 electrical degree phase shift. The value of inrush current at different switching
instants is given in Table 4. The resultant waveforms are shown in Figure 6.

Table 4. Value of inrush current at different firing angles

Firing angle (Degree) Phase R Current (A) Phase Y Current (A) Phase B Current (A)
0 134.0 56.3 134.4
30 157.5 61.8 158.0
60 120.5 67.8 120.8
90 39.2 40 33
180 150 53.1 150

Figure 6. Inrush current in three phases with controlled switching technique

Indonesian J Elec Eng & Comp Sci, Vol. 20, No. 1, October 2020 : 39 - 45
Indonesian J Elec Eng & Comp Sci ISSN: 2502-4752  43

2.3. Effect of pre-fluxing method:

In pre-fluxing method, to reduce the magnitude of inrush current, pre-fluxing device is used [25].
This device consists of a capacitor, which is charged to a user specified voltage and discharged into
the transformer. During the discharging period, circuit breaker should be closed. To reduce the inrush current
magnitude, the residual flux of the transformer must be high. Figures 7 and 8 shows the pre-fluxing device
and its connection at the primary side of the three-phase power transformer. Figure 9 shows the resulted
reduced inrush current with magnitude of 32.62A. The filter connected in the primary side blocks
the harmonics present in inrush current. This resultant current is free from DC component also which delays
the response of protection system and causes mal-operation of relay.

To Primary
Conductor

Three – phase Three – phase power

Controlled switching
source transformer
Line Isolator

Cpf Vcap Lm

Switch

Filter
Line Isolator

Pre – fluxing device

To Ground
Connection

Figure 7. Pre fluxing device Figure 8. Pre-fluxing device at primary of power transformer

Figure 9. Mitigated inrush current in phase three phases

3. RESULTS
Table 5 shows the comparision among the three techniques presented in this paper. Result shows
that both the controlled switching and pre-fluxing method have reduced the magnitude of inrush current.
But with pre-fluxing method, the DC component is also gets eliminated.

Table 5. Comparision among different methods

Mitigation methods R-phase (A) Y-phase (A) B-phase (A)
Pre-insertion Resistor 131.11 123.6 96.17
Controlled switching 39.20 40.00 33.31
Pre-fluxing method 32.62 37.65 37.25

Mitigation of magnetising inrush current in three-phase power transformer (Mudita Banerjee)

44  ISSN: 2502-4752

4. CONCLUSION
In this paper, effective methods are simulated and their results are being compared to get
the mitigated inrush current. The implementation of controlled switching method is simple which has
approximately nullified the inrush current. Controlled switching is easier as compared to Pre-insertion
resistor method. Further, it can be seen that, with the application of pre-fluxing technique, the magnitude of
inrush current is reduced considerably along with the elimination of DC component. Therefore, the best
method for mitigation of inrush current in power transformer is pre-fluxing.

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Indonesian J Elec Eng & Comp Sci, Vol. 20, No. 1, October 2020 : 39 - 45
Indonesian J Elec Eng & Comp Sci ISSN: 2502-4752  45

BIOGRAPHIES OF AUTHORS

Mudita Banerjee had obtained the B.E. (Electrical) and M.Tech.(Power Electronics and Power
System) from Nagpur University, India. Currently, she is pusuing Ph.D. from Manav Rachna
International Institute of Research and Studies, Faridabad, India.. She is a Member of
the Institution of Engineers (India) and a Life Member of the Indian Society for Technical
Education. Her main areas of interest are Network Analysis, Power System Protection and
Electrical Machines

Dr. Anita Khosla is Professor & Head of Electrical & Electronics Engineering Department,
Manav Rachna International Institute of Research and Studies. She has more than 25 years of
teaching experience. She has more than 25 publications in reputed journals & conferences and 3
books to her credit. She is life time member of ISTE and Institution of Engineers (India).
Her main areas of interest are Control System, Power Electronics and Automation.

Mitigation of magnetising inrush current in three-phase power transformer (Mudita Banerjee)